


serendipity, they say (it's a lie)

by highfalutin baby birb (fevered_dreams)



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Dark, Drugs, M/M, Organized Crime, Prostitute Lance (Voltron), Prostitution, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-14
Updated: 2019-05-19
Packaged: 2020-01-12 22:56:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18456305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fevered_dreams/pseuds/highfalutin%20baby%20birb
Summary: In the midst of a blizzard, Keith meets a lovely, lone prostitute huddled beneath neon lights and the promise of borrowed affection — all for the right price.Then, he makes a mistake. He falls in love.“You look beautiful,” Keith breathes, and he means it.Lance turns to him slowly, lips downturned and expression banal. “Spare me the empty flattery.”“It’s not flattery. It’s the truth,” Keith insists.“And you really think I want to hear it now?”Keith glances at the double-wide, wooden doors beside them because, behind them, Zarkon waits. He waits for Lance.Because Lance is beautiful.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The dogs will feast well, one day. Bloody sinews and all.

Today, it snows.

They’ve sent him out to do their dirty work during one of the worst snowstorms of the season, and they’ve done so with smiles on their faces and a mockery in their mouths, stuck fast to the bits of chewing tobacco they can’t quite spit out.

Keith wishes he had something similar to occupy his mouth with — something like a real, bona fide cigarette to stave away the biting cold. Except, he quit those damn things years ago. He still can’t hold one properly after futilely trying to sneak some of the boss’ premium cigar stock for himself.

The inside of his cheek still stings, sometimes, from the lingering burn there, nestled right up against his upper gums. The burn of a cigarette isn’t nearly as comforting when one is forced to swallow it down, after all. It had been his first taste of smoke. Fourteen at the time, he just wanted to try it — to understand what the hype was about and why so many people paid so extravagantly for them when they looked so mundane.

It had been his first mistake. He plans to keep it as his last.

So, he grins and bears his teeth down hard as he soldiers on. The snow had been nothing more than a simple nuisance when he first left the mansion. Now, he fears he might drown in it.

He fears he might want to.

Regardless, he continues. He has little other option.

And, even as a blizzard rages on around them, the red light district never ceases to bustle. People pass by with hardly any care for him, so focused they are on peering through the cloyingly-bright brothel windows. Despite the piles of clothes they don against the cold, the wanton looks of appraisal they wear are inescapable.

A cute young woman in a doorway giggles as a man pauses in front of her. He stops to admire. She beckons him in with another laugh, absolutely affable despite the pinpricks pulsing across her bare skin after a particularly fierce gale strikes them. The man cocks his head to the side and speaks a few words. She responds with an encouraging smile that verges on desperate.

The man shakes his head and leaves. She calls out to him as he begins to walk away, so sweet and so somber. He does not look back. When he rounds the corner to the next block, the cute young woman bows her head, defeated. Keith thinks he even spot a few tears trickle down her hollowed cheeks, too salty for the cold to stop.

She must be hungry. She looks terribly skinny. Definitely not well-equipped against the chill with those sharp bones of hers. Keith suspects that she will very likely go without food if she doesn’t reel in a customer soon.

Keith, too, leaves her behind before he can think about it too much. He also has own job to do, after all, and his own consequences to face if he performs poorly. Her brothel isn’t Keith’s target tonight.

For her brothel only stocks cocaine. Tonight, he delivers heroin.

So, he goes on, and he tries his best to not think about protruding bones and sunken eyes as he walks.

 

* * *

 

 

It takes him another twenty minutes to reach his destination. Over the course of a few short hours, the snow has already grown to the middle of Keith’s shins. He trudges through the ever-increasing banks at a pitiful pace, but he gets there eventually. And still, other men continue to trudge beside him, looking for something — or someone — to make them feel better on this cold, lonely night.

Keith considers them pitiful, sad men. They probably think the same of him.

“About time you got here. I was starting to think you’d bailed on us, or taken it all for yourself.”

Keith looks up with his lips thinned so tight his face might split apart at the seams. He feels just about ready to leak out blood, brains, and regret all over the white, white snow in an absolutely hideous display. Sendak would probably love that, honestly. He would revel in Keith’s dead body before feeding it to the dogs with glee.

He’s probably quite nutritious. Despair fuels living creatures well, after all. He knows that for a fact.

Because the despair keeps him together now. It reminds him that, finally, his destination stands before him. He now has the chance to warm himself up inside, even if only for the few moments it takes to hand over the goods, and the debt chips away little by little. Little by little, Keith’s burden falls away from him at a tortuous pace. He might not live long enough to see it go.

In fact, he probably won’t.

“Well? What are you waiting for? I don’t have all day.”

“Of course not,” Keith mutters. He takes a step forward, only to sink into and stumble over the fresh snow with a painful lurch, like an abandoned pup caught in a bear trap. He waits for the day he’ll have to gnaw off his own leg to escape, only to bleed to death in then attempt.

Above him, Sendak laughs. He grins down at Keith with menace, and all Keith can do in response is smile. Be agreeable and avoid stirring up trouble.

Because Keith is weak. He is far too weak to do anything, so he must bow his head and wait for the shame to overtake him.

As soon as Keith steps inside, Sendak hauls his delivery away from him to count the inventory. He will do so meticulously, and he will find each and every vial present and perfectly intact because Keith does not make mistakes anymore.

He refuses to.

Nonetheless, Sendak will undoubtedly find some fault in his delivery. Sometimes he cites damaged goods as he waves freshly-broken pieces of glass in front of Keith’s face. Other times, he claims something has gone missing after pilfering it for himself. In the moments beforehand, Keith can only wait and see what today’s claim will be.

At least the fellow weak still treat him kindly.

This brothel’s employees have always been particularly nice to him; they brew him a quick cup of cheap, too-bitter tea to help warm him up before stuffing a few stale cookies in his hands. He eats and drinks as quickly as possible before shooing them away as soon as he hears Sendak’s return.

Tonight, Sendak comes back sooner than usual, Keith notes. He doesn’t even get the chance to thank anyone for thinking of him.

And, tonight, Sendak simple states that Keith took too long.

“You know we run on a tight schedule,” Sendak growls haughtily. “Just because you couldn’t drive here doesn’t mean it should’ve taken you so long to get here. You’re just lucky we didn’t lose out on any significant profits because of you.”

Keith doesn’t mention how ridiculous Sendak sounds right now. He doesn’t mention the blizzard beating insistently over them, and he most definitely avoids mentioning the fact that they had sent him precisely because no one else would’ve arrived here nearly as fast as he had.

No, Keith makes no mention of any of that because Sendak surely knows. Sendak’s no fool, after all. Just cruel. A cruel man who simply loves to lord over others.

Keith thinks some part of Sendak’s nature stems from his inferiority complex. Keith has overheard several conversations during which Sendak raged over the perceived slight against him for his unfairly meager position in the group.

“They’ve put me in charge of this shit-hole whorehouse, and they expect me to be happy about it!” Sendak had exclaimed one time, like a beast. “When I can do so much better! I can do better than half of those fuckers sitting their fat asses down in that damn house. I bet they’re laughing at me right now, but, mark my words, one day I’ll be the one laughing at them.”

Sendak doesn’t laugh now, though. He still stands as nothing more than the manager of this establishment he sees as nothing more than a shithole whorehouse, and here he will be for the foreseeable future.

His pride’s wounded, he’s an asshole to the core regardless, and others must suffer for it.

As a result, Sendak hisses out a, “I want you to go help me take out the trash for the trouble you’ve caused me,” before sending Keith right back into the storm.

Keith’s despair grows.

The dogs will feast well, one day. Bloody sinews and all.

 

* * *

 

 

The trash is a dead man. He gazes up at Keith with vacant eyes, pupils blown wide in death, mouth ajar and body sickly still.

An overdose, probably.

No wonder Sendak’s so pissed. The loss of loyal customer must cut into profits, and decreased profits never looks good to the brass.

Thankfully, the body is still relatively fresh, and the ever-present snowfall has helped to keep it somewhat preserved. It takes Keith only a bit of effort to haul the body away from the almost-open into a mostly-hidden side alley leading to the brothel. There, he can work on disassembling the body for easier disposal.

There, he finds something else — another man, living this time, bundled up in a few cheap, thin blankets seated near the brothel’s side entrance.

And, despite the blue tinge to his lips and red-splattered, wind-swept face, the man is absolutely gorgeous under the red neon lights. His eyes, big and blue like the oceanfront Keith used to live by when life was so nice and simple, blink up at Keith slowly.

Keith falls into them at a hasty clip, and he finds he wouldn’t mind sinking into them forever. Sinking would be easy.

He never was all that good at swimming.

Then, the man speaks.

“About time Sendak sent someone to deal with him. He was starting to scare away our customers.”

Even his voice sounds nice. Keith leans into it, and he almost forgets to say something in response until the man stops shivering hard enough to raise a single eyebrow up in question.

“I don’t think I recognize you,” Keith says haltingly, teeth chattering all the while. “Who are you? What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing. I haven’t seen you around before, but you certainly are capable of lugging that dead body around with ease. Finesse, even.”

Keith snorts, and frozen mucous almost shoots straight out of his nose as a result.

“I don’t know how much finesse there can possibly be when it comes to tearing apart a dead body, but thanks. The name’s Keith, by the way.”

“Lance.”

 _Lance_.

A name with affect. Not the verb. The emotion. The drive. The state of mind and unerring emotional burden.

The desire.

“Lance,” Keith repeats slowly. He savors the way it melts on his tongue, smooth and thick like spiked molasses. He swallows, and it burns down his throat something fierce.

He likes it. Wants more. Desperately hopes that he hasn’t picked up on the greed and gluttony he keeps seeing around him.

Knows he probably has.

“You a new employee then? Or, as Sendak likes to call us, a glorified cock-warmer? You are a pretty cute one, even if look a little more rough-around-the-edges than most people would like with that ridiculous mullet of yours. Though, I guess plenty of other people like that,” Lance says, and he speaks so casually Keith almost chokes on the residual heat he can’t completely get down.

“No,” Keith stutters. “No, I’m just… an errand boy, I guess.”

“Yeah? Haven’t seen you before. Guess you’ve probably been busy helping out with some of the other places instead.”

“I assume you’re also new?” Keith asks.

“Yeah. Just started a few weeks ago, right after they picked me up.” Lance smiles up at Keith wryly, and his eyes shine red beneath the cloying shine the neon lights cast over them.

“What are you doing out here then?”

“Pissed Sendak off,” Lance says lightly. “Kicked a guy in the balls after he tried shoving a half-full beer bottle up my ass, just for the hell of it. I ended up literally busting one of his nuts, and Sendak threw a damn fit over all the money I cost us.” He huffs indignantly. “So now I’m out here as punishment.”

“You’re gonna freeze to death out here, and that’ll just cost him even more. I’m not saying you wouldn’t look good regardless, but I’m pretty sure most people don’t find frostbite and missing toes particularly attractive,” Keith argues.

Lance shrugs. “It’s fine. Sendak already thought of that. He’s _smart_ like that, or so he says” He pulls one of his hands out from under his blanket to reveal a surprisingly nice pair of gloves. His feet, also, are diligently covered in thick socks. “So, it’s not all that bad. He’s not allowed to make it that bad.”

“Well, either way, best stick your nose and ears back under that blanket of yours. I see Sendak didn’t give you a scarf or hat to keep those warm.”

Lance smiles, all tooth and all pretty. “Aww, look at you, actually giving a shit about little ole me. This feels like a weird fever dream.”

Keith swallows hard. “Not a dream. This is all too ridiculous to be a dream.”

Keith gestures to the dead man with a vague swirl of his arm, then back at Lance where Sendak’s left him. For a split second, as Lance gapes up at him with those woefully big eyes of his, Keith thinks he might’ve been rude with that. Too insensitive. After all, Lance has probably been sitting out in the freezing cold for hours now, right next to a corpse. He might be feeling a bit delicate, to say the least.

Except, Lance just laughs. The sound comes out big and bright, and it bounces gently off the snow until it hits Keith square in the chest, like shrapnel shearing his lungs apart, leaving him to bleed to death in wonder.

“I guess you’re right,” Lance whispers. “The books we used to read never taught us any of this. They made happy endings look real.”

Keith’s throat tightens, and the snow nearly suffocates him. “Hey, do you want me to… uh, try to convince Sendak to let you back in soon? I mean, if you’re new, then it benefits him to have you stick around and get acquainted with everything, right?”

Lance shakes his head ruefully. The snowflakes slide off his hair in slow pirouettes before landing atop his cheeks. It’s a nice place to melt away, Keith thinks.

“It’s no use. I pissed him off real good by arguing with him afterwards. The only reason he didn’t beat me to death for it is because he’d catch hell for it from the higher up’s. Besides, it’s not like this kind of work requires a lot of training.”

“No. I guess mine doesn’t either,” Keith admits quietly.

Lance’s gaze flickers over to he limp body in Keith’s grasp. “You don’t need to be trained on how to hide a body?” he asks, equal parts teasing and intrigued.

“Nah. This stuff is easy. Watch it once and you know it for life,” Keith replies. Then, he pauses. “But, um — You don’t have to watch this. If Sendak won’t let you leave from this spot, I can just find somewhere else to… finish the job.”

“It’s fine. I know this spot here is probably easiest for you. Not even the cops who care like to come around back here. Anyway, it’s not like I’ve never seen someone die before.” Lance’s breath puffs up in front of him like a prayer caught in a typhoon, hopeful and oh-so hopeless. “It might even do me some good to see some more.”

Keith doesn’t respond. He isn’t sure what he might say if he does, and he finds that he doesn’t even want to listen to his own damn words right now. Instead, he silently drops the body into the snow, watches it sink, and pulls out the cleaver Sendak handed him earlier.

He lifts his hand, eager to get this over with. Afterwards, he’ll have to dump rotten fish innards and discarded animal skins to cover up the human blood beneath it all, but at least the snow will make that a touch easier. Nowadays, he considers that the worst part.

He glances over at Lance; he’s burrowed his way back under the blankets, but he doesn’t hide away or cover up his eyes at all. No, he just stares right on through Keith like it’s nothing.

Like this is _easy_.

Keith doesn’t find this easy. Simple, perhaps, because there really isn’t much to disposing of a body, but never easy.

He takes in a deep, shuddering breath and feels his throat and lungs revel violently against the freeze. Then, he begins.

The head comes off first. The human neck might be a strong little bastard, but Keith prefers to get that out of the way as soon as possible; it makes the whole ordeal just a touch more bearable. He breaks teeth, snapping them apart with the butt of the knife until there’s hardly anything left except sharp edges and mocking gleams.

Dental records were always a bitch.

Then goes the arms, easily extracted with a good snap at the sockets. He always has some trouble with the legs, but this guy’s a damn stick, so they come off fairly quickly.

Or _was_ a stick.

For the torso, Keith does the best he can. Tonight, that just means getting the guts out so he can throw them into the docks for the fish to feed on. Otherwise, he leaves it mostly intact before stuffing everything into several small bags for the incinerator and hastily shoveling away the more heavily-stained snow.

All the while, Lance watches on in silence. He even watches Keith quickly disappear into the brothel before returning with a bucket of fish guts and a bit of old beer to hide it all with.

“Sorry about this,” Keith says. “It’s not gonna smell particularly nice.”

“That’s alright. I’m sure this was just all part of Sendak’s punishment.”

Keith dumps it and winces when the smell rides the storm breeze over them, heavy and noxious.

Lance doesn’t even blink.

And, even while frozen pink and purple on the middle of bloodied-snow and rancid, festering fish innards, Lance looks stunning.

Keith thinks about how popular Lance must be at the brothel, with that pretty little face and plump lips of his. It’s a terrible thought, but it doesn’t leave him no matter how much he wills for it to.

“What the fuck are you doing out there? We don’t have all day to wait for you to finish! The snow’s gonna stop soon, and then it’ll be even harder it hide!” Sendak roars from inside.

Keith sneaks another look Lance’s way, frozen in the spot until Sendak starts yelling again, closer this time.

“You should go, or else he’ll end up bitching at the both of us even more,” Lance says.

“Yeah.” Keith pauses and grapples lamely for words. “Stay —”

Stay what?

Safe? Happy? Out of this place? Away from these horrible people?

Keith says none of those. He can’t mock Lance like that when he’s already here.

Instead, he just says, “Stay warm, Lance,” and feels like an asshole.

Nonetheless, Lance accepts it with a smile gilded across those gorgeous lips of his, chapped and blue they may be. “You too, Keith.”

Keith turns, and he leaves Lance behind in the cold.

Like a coward.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Except childlike giddiness doesn’t make the next part any easier. Washing another person’s hair is one thing. Cleaning the body proves to be something else entirely.
> 
> Lance’s skin is smooth beneath his rough, scarred fingertips. He emanates absolute warmth, even beyond the steam rising dangerously through the room, and Keith wants to touch every scrap of skin he can find, intact or not.

Keith doesn’t see Lance again for two weeks.

Of course, Keith’s already back at Sendak’s brothel within a few days, delivering a new packet of heroin, much to Sendak’s simultaneous chagrin and amusement. He smiles wickedly when he spots the bruise settling against the right side of Keith’s face. It spreads purple and yellow, deep and close to festering over the fragile skin beneath Keith’s eye. Zarkon, pissed about Sendak’s report of Keith’s apparent pilfering of supplies, had beat his face bloody as an example to a handful of the other woeful recruits. As if he really needed any more examples than the ones he's already given them.

After all, a dead man with his brains blown out by a high-caliber gun makes a wonderfully vivid example. One doesn't forget the sight of brain matter affixed to shards of bare skull easily. 

Keith certainly hasn't. 

At least Zarkon only hit one side. A carefully considered, lovingly chosen side. That way, even if something _unfortunate_ were to happen during his punishment, he’d still have no eye to see out of.

Because an errand boy who can’t see where he’s going is useless. A dead one, beaten to a blood pulp, chest caved from the force, even more so. Zarkon should know. The death of the last one affected their bottom line more than he anticipated.

But the knuckles bearing down against his cheekbone had occurred two weeks ago, and Sendak’s initial reveling at the sight had been ten days ago. Since then, Keith has visited that same brothel three other times for this and that — all busy work to remind him of his station, as if he could ever forget the cloying vice grip they have over him — but not once has he seen Lance.

Oh, he’s seen plenty of the other employees, in the meantime. Romelle’s still there, paying off old debts to keep her younger brother out of the mess their parents left them with. Once, when Sendak’s otherwise preoccupied with reprimanding another poor, starved thing under his employ, Keith even goes ahead and asks her about Lance.

“Lance?” she repeats, head cocked to the side and nose wrinkled in thought.

“He’s one of the new guys. I don’t know if you’ve gotten the chance to meet him yet,” Keith explains.

She remains silent for some time before realization strikes. “Oh, Lance! Yeah, I’ve met him before. A bit mouthy, but sweet. Though, I don’t know much about him, to be honest. I don’t think he’s actually here very often.”

Keith frowns, and his brows knit together so tight they pull on his bruise, aggravating the barely healed cut under his eye. Without a word, she reaches behind, returning with a tissue to dab away at the slowly pooling blood. It’s the cheap stuff, infinitely scratchy and hardly absorbent, but Keith appreciates the sentiment with everything he has.

Which, honestly, is not much, but it’s the thought the counts. Right?

Yeah right. If thoughts could truly bestow such things, then he wouldn't be in this situation in the first place. But he is. So, he swallows down the saliva pooling thick in his mouth, and he goes on.

“Is he a temp?” Keith asks once the blood clumsily clots over itself again, like knobby knees tripping over river stones. “Or is he a traveler?”

“I don’t think he’s either,” Romelle says with a shake of her head. Her blond strands, pretty and long, look dull and brittle now, as if they simple effort of existing weighs them down unbearably heavy. Keith hopes she’s eating well.

He knows she isn’t.

“Whenever I see him leave, he’s accompanied by important-looking members of the Family, all dressed up in their freshly-pressed suits and perfectly shined shoes. Not like the others who get hauled away in those broken-down vans,” Romelle continues.

“You think they’re punishing him personally? You did say he was mouthy, and last time I saw him he was sitting out in the blizzard for injuring a customer.”

“No, he always comes back looking well enough.”

Odd. Keith finds the whole thing odd, but he can think of no possible explanations, and Romelle possesses none of her own she can offer. So, for a few more minutes, they sit with each other amicable silence. They sit and offer each other small, sad smiles as the sound of a body hitting the floor.

Something crashes above them — most likely another broken lamp or vase Keith will have to clean up. Sendak, for all his self-importance and confidence, has apparently never mastered the art of using a handy-dandy broom and dustpan. He probably considers himself too good for such paltry tasks. 

“Keith! Get your ass up here!” Sendak roars, right on time. “I won’t ask twice!”

Keith sighs. The moment comes to a sputtering close, full of plot holes and inconsistencies, but he can’t say it’s a surprising conclusion.

Romelle smiles and smiles as he stands, but her eyes dip into something bloated with longing and loneliness, like a rotting body found along the coastline.

_Keith's dad had probably looked just like that._

Quite frankly, Keith finds it hard to look at her now, but he’d never turn away when she looks at him with such a harried expression. He hasn't been that cruel, yet.

“Looks like it’s time for you to go,” she whispers. Another one of Sendak’s ridiculous growls nearly muffle her words completely, but she carries on regardless. “Come sit with me another time, yeah?”

“Yeah. Of course.”

More yelling. A little crying. Something falls again, and Keith hates the sick relief that careens through his body when he sees that Lance isn’t the one Sendak tosses around today.

Since when, Keith wonders, did he become so despicable?

 

* * *

 

Then, after two long weeks, Keith finally runs into Lance again.

And Lance is so, so pretty. This time, he's fumbling around the brothel kitchen when Keith spots him, pants slung low and oversized shirt slipping off a sharp, hickey-covered shoulder.

It’s not surprising. Lance is a noticeably lean man, after all, comprised of sharp points, from his elbows and knees to the tip of his nose and end of his chin. Of course everything would be terribly big on his narrow hips. If Keith were to reach forward — so innocuously, gentle like a morning gale from the oceanfront making a leisurely trip to the nearby mountain peaks — he suspects it would be so easy to completely envelop Lance’s tiny little waist within his hands.

Keith steps forward without thinking. Then, he realizes what he’s done. Regardless, he takes another step beyond his volition, rationale forgotten in some dank annul of time.

Another.

He keeps moving, each step suspiciously quiet until he’s so, so close he can probably feel the loose hairs on Lance’s nape tickling the back of his hand just by raising it.

Suddenly, Lance turns around. He startles when he spots Keith, nearly dropping the bowl in his hands. Thankfully, at the last minute, he manages to catch himself. Furthermore, he doesn’t even scream.

Sendak hates screaming. He hates anything that might suggest any inefficiency on his part. A scream of terror from an important employee of his induced by an indebted errand boy would certainly by considered a sign of inefficiency.

“Keith?” Lance breathes after catching his breath. “What are you doing, sneaking up on people like that? I could’ve killed you, you know.”

“And how could you have killed me?” Keith can’t help but ask, even though he should really be apologizing right now.

Lance huffs angrily, reminiscent of an angry kitten, hackles raised and eyes sharp. “I just about stabbed with this rusty knife here! Even if the wound itself didn’t kill you, I’m sure the tetanus would’ve done something plenty nasty.”

The knife certainly is rusty. Dull and worn, it doesn’t even glint beneath the flickering lights in the kitchen. Regardless, Lance eventually resumes to his task of cutting up barely-edible cauliflower, and Keith winces as Lance slices through a particularly rotten portion of the head.

How pitiable is a life wrought with rotting fruits and cheap, hardly serviceable knives. Though, Keith gets the impression that Lance doesn’t exactly appreciate being inundated with unwanted pity, so he doesn’t say anything, even as he watches Lance throw away chunks upon chunks of molded fruit into the overflowing trash can with a disgruntled frown.

Lance says nothing as he continues, now engrossed in cutting away over-ripe pieces of mango. He just goes on and on, feigning simple contentedness despite the crinkle of his mouth and tense, unforgiving grip of his hand, adorned with long smile finger and blunt nails, meticulously cut and maintained to avoid untoward injuries against customers.

How pitiable is a life dependent on gross, horny men willing to pay out their ass for a single night with a beautiful young thing who’s been coerced into selling their body.

Lance does not want to be pitied. Of that, Keith knows. 

None of them do.

Keith takes another step. Assured he moves, and he waits.

Lance eyes Keith suspiciously in turn, body tense. The corner of his lips turn upwards, but his smile doesn’t strike Keith as amiable, necessarily. Nonetheless, he offer Keith some of the few scraps of mango he was able to scrounge up.

Keith takes a bite. It tastes sickly sweet, and it melts under his tongue with a false, saccharine promise of everything he’s ever hoped for, but he chews and swallows until the feeling exists as nothing but a faint memory in the pit of his stomach — sweet and cloying, heavy and wonderful, dragging him down like stones affixed to his wrists. If he closes his eyes for long enough, he can just about feel the lapping of waves against his body.

In his imagination, drowning doesn’t even feel all that bad.

“I haven’t seen you in awhile,” Keith finally says after the mango finally begins to dissolve. “How have you been?”

He doesn’t pry. He refrains from asking where Lance has been all time, or why Romelle often sees him being whisked away by seemingly high-ranking members of the Family. He reveals none of his true thoughts. He bites his tongue and smiles in spite of the blood pooling in the far recesses of his mouth, and he prays that the glint of his teeth entices Lance into responding.

Because, honestly, Keith has never been particularly adept at smooth-talking others into doing as he pleased. Without fail, Zarkon always claims such indomitable truths as his main reason for keeping Keith so tight and lowly under his thumb; even as he tosses Keith around without abandon, he coos at Keith nicely with such thing. He acts the merciful benefactor as he throws glass shards Keith’s direction, and he plays the part surprisingly well because even mafia groups need a straight-shooter. It helps them appeal to the people, Zarkon says, and he almost looks friendly when such words come out of his mouth.

Or perhaps Keith has simply forgotten what true kindness looks like.

Lance presses another forkful of fresh mango against Keith’s lips. The juices pile against the flesh there, dripping down over his chin until he opens his mouth to accept the gift, all teeth and skepticism. But it tastes good. It melts over Keith’s tongue like an empty promise, but he finds no hidden blades within the stringy flesh. Nowadays, that’s more than he could ever ask for.

Lance smiles benignly before responding. “Oh, you know, just fine, going here and there. Wherever they tell me to, really. What I do in my free time usually isn’t up to me, so it’s hard to know when I’ll get time to myself. If I did, I’d definitely let you know.”

He speaks so easily, Keith notes, soft and calm despite the dilapidated conditions surrounding him. Even the look in his eyes verges on content, though the film of distaste never quite leaves those baby blues of his. Regardless, Keith finds himself transfixed.

He takes another step forward. In response, Lance takes an aborted step backwards, and they’re stuck staring each other down.

Questions arise, polluting the air with a film of grease that threatens to suffocate the both of them from stubbornness. They’re both stubborn, it seems. A clash of personalities such as theirs’ hardly ends in anyone’s favor.

In the end, Keith bows out first. He can’t stand the harsh glint Lance’s eyes have taken, sentimental and weak as he is, so he folds so hard he nearly bends in half, bones creaking and ears roaring with the tell-tale sign of a tsunami in the shores, heavy with promise and persecution.

He’s weak — always has been, probably. That’s what landed him here, after all.

That and the sins of his father, but Keith hates dwelling on such matters when he stands before beautiful men who have even forced into selling their bodies by men like Zarkon and Sendak.

“I guess you have a point,” Keith eventually answers. “Sendak does like to be in control of those kinds of things.”

The planes on Lance’s shoulders smooth into something akin to relaxed, and he smiles at Keith again — truly smiles, with teeth, gums, and he whole shebang.

And Keith’s left breathless in its wake, blinking away desire.

“Don’t even start. I have so much I could say about Sendak and his controlling ways,” Lance scoffs. “But it’s probably beer if we don’t go into too much detail about that. Wouldn’t want to get thrown out in the freezing cold again, after all.”

“That’s true. I’m glad to see that you’re doing ok after that.”

“Of course I am! Like I said, Sendak would never let anything _too_ bad happen to me. It’d decrease profits, and money always speaks louder than words. According to my customers, my ass and mouth are still as hot and wet as ever, so all’s well that ends well, yeah?”

Keith nods dumbly. In fact, he feels so dumb he doesn’t even realize he’s half-hard until Lance not-so-subtly points it out to him with hard flicker of his eyes.

“I — I’m sorry,” Keith stutters. He wills himself to calm down despite the image his mind treacherously conjures up of Lance’s pretty mouth stuffed full of Keith’s cock. He tries so fucking hard to stop thinking about Lance’s beautifully pert ass dripping with lube, ready and waiting for a nice, hard dick to slip inside between his cheeks, but nothing works.

Because he is terrible, and he wants.

To his credit, Lance takes the entire display with grace. He claps a warm hand atop Keith’s shoulders, adorned with long, cracked fingers before smiling with so much sweetness Keith just about falls into diabetic shock.

“Don’t worry about it. We all get like that sometimes. It’s part of the job,” Lance soothes.

Keith nods dumbly in response before absentmindedly swallowing down another chunk of mango. Its juices drip down Keith’s jaw before Lance wipes it away with a light wink.

“Don’t think so much. It’s not gonna do you much good here.”

And that Keith agrees with, even past the wanton throbbing of his dick.

 

* * *

 

The next time Keith sees Lance, it’s in the middle of an absolutely filthy gang bang.

Why Sendak sent him up here is a mystery. Keith’s sure that Sendak has no single inkling regarding Keith’s sparse run-in’s with Lance so far. And yet, Sendak has never before asked Keith to go and check on one of the employees during on of their sacred ‘meetings’ with a client.

Or, in Lance’s case, three clients.

Nevertheless, Sendak had frantically sent Keith up here with an armful of chilled water bottles, nutritious snacks, and fluffy towels before hiding away in his office with a disgruntled frown. As a result, Keith now stands in the middle of on the largest, most well-maintained rooms of the building as Lance gets thoroughly fucked.

And, as much as he hates to admit it, Lance really is skilled at this. Even with two dicks inside his ass and one planted deep within his throat, Lance looks as stunning as ever. Honestly, the tears running down his cheeks only serve to make him look even more enticing than usual with the way they frame his eyes while accentuating his prominent cheekbones. It’s no wonder he’s so popular.

It’s also no wonder Keith’s so turned on by the spectacle in front of him despite the cruel, flippant manner in which the men treat Lance. Because they treat him like a living sex toy, dragging him here by his fluffy brown hair, throwing him there by the slim expanse of his bruise-encrusted neck.

They’re so consumed by their eternal quest for pleasure from the youthful body of a breathtaking they don’t even notice Keith standing in the doorway until they’ve filled and covered Lance in cum. When they do, they storm at the room with haughty sneers, eagerly grabbing water and towels from him as they saunter away, limp dicks flopping in the air with an uninspiring lilt.

Keith briefly considers grabbing one of their balls so hard it snaps. Then, at the last minute, he stops himself in favor of stepping into the room to help prop Lance up against on the pillows.

“Sorry you had to see that. To be honest, I’m kinda fucking pissed that Sendak made you come up here in the first place,” Lance breathes. He shoots Keith a weak grin, but it’s not exactly reassuring when there’s blood soaking into the bedsheets.

Red splotches greet Keith with a wicked vindication. He's long gotten over his revulsion to fresh blood, but, now, he can't help the regretful disgust clawing up his throat.

And yet, he can hardly tear his eyes away from the way they seem to glow under the dim overhead lights.

“It’s fine,” Keith whispers. “It happens.”

That’s a lie. Never before has Sendak instructed Keith to look over one of the brothel’s numerous ‘business meetings’ before. Even when Keith insisted on it to ensure the safety of the others, Sendak simply laughed him off derisively, menacing like a hyena towering over its kill, before sending him away to deal with another poor sap who failed to repay their debt on time.

However, with Lance, Sendak looked nearly frantic as he sent Keith away, eyes darting and teeth bared into the saddest snarl Keith had ever born witness to.

He wonders why.

He wonders what the fuck is going on with Lance.

Lance interrupts his thoughts with a wretched coughing fit, heavy with phlegm wrought straight from his lungs. Hastily, Keith stumbles over himself to offer Lance the sole bottle of water left over.

“Thanks. You’re really great, you know. I don’t know what I’d do without you,” Lance croaks after downing half the bottle in one go.

“I’ve hardly done anything for you,” Keith argues.

“Even a little is a lot sometimes.”

Keith can’t argue with that. So, he sticks around for awhile, grateful for the brief peace and quiet Sendak graces him with now. With a firm grip, he laces an arms across Lance’s smooth torso to help haul him to the nearest bathroom, staunchly pushing the leaking blood out of his mind until Lance sits safely in the grimy bathtub.

“Hate to ask this of you, but would you mind helping me a bit? I’m feeling a bit sore after all that, but I need to get cleaned up, or I might just lose my fucking mind,” Lance breezes.

He looks sore, too. Fresh bruises have already begun to bloom across his golden skin, and the bags beneath his eyes pop with the ferocity of a caged dog. Tiredly, he blinks up at Keith — imploring are those eyes, beaten and brave.

Keith can’t possibly turn him down now.

And Sendak doesn’t call for him.

Carefully, with trembling hands and a weak will, he turns the water on and watches it fill the tub until it turns sickly pink. Then, he drains the remnants, repeating the process until it runs hot and clear. Slowly, Lance settles into the warmth, overcome with steam as his face flushed rose.

“Is it — is it too hot?” Keith asks quietly.

“No. It’s perfect. Thank you,” Lance replies, equally as soft, but so much lovelier.

He basks in the tub for some time with his eyes closed and waiting. He waits for Keith to move again.

Keith doesn’t. He doesn’t do anything else until Lance looks at him once more, eyebrow raised and lovely lips upturned in a questioning smirk.

“What? You not gonna wash my hair or soap up my body?” Lance asks.

“Do you want me to?”

“Yes. Please.”

Lance makes it sound so easy. He makes it sound easy for Keith to reach over his body go grasp the cheap bottle of combination shampoo and conditioner off the ledge. He makes it sound so easy to lather it up before running hesitant fingers over his scalp. Lance moans softly under Keith’s ministrations, eyes lidded and lips slightly parted all the while.

He looks good like this. Even better than when he was being fucked mere minutes ago.

Keith feels giddy at the thought.

Except childlike giddiness doesn’t make the next part any easier. Washing another person’s hair is one thing. Cleaning the body proves to be something else entirely.

Lance’s skin is smooth beneath his rough, scarred fingertips. He emanates absolute warmth, even beyond the steam rising dangerously through the room, and Keith wants to touch every scrap of skin he can find, intact or not.

His fingers flit to the back, and he feels bones and bones jutting out past Lance’s back, from his shoulder blades across his spine. Even his hip bones present themselves prominently, but Lance is so fucking attractive in spite of the boundaries Keith keeps crossing.

He dips roaming fingers lower. They find a score of skin rubbed raw, and, without warning, he digs his blunt nails deep into the dermis. Lance winces at the touch, but he makes no attempt to flee. He sits perfectly still, even after the clouded water once again takes on a red hue.

Too lenient. He’s being far too lenient on Keith.

“Sorry about that,” Keith offers belatedly. Reluctantly, he draws away. The water has pruned his fingers into something disgusting.

Not disgusting enough.

“It’s fine. I needed to get that cleaned anyway,” Lance says offhandedly. “I’m probably clean enough now, though. Help me out?”

This time, Keith vows to be gentle. Gently — oh so gently — he guides Lance away from the pink draining from the tub into a scratchy bathrobe. Over the next few hours, the cheap fabric will likely aggravate at his wounds, but for now, Lance looks plenty pleased with the accommodations.

“Sorry for making you do all that for me. I hope you didn’t feel pressured into it or anything,” Lance says. “You can always say no if it’s uncomfortable for you.”

“It’s fine. We little people gotta stick together, right?”

Lance laughs prettily; it reminds Keith of the twinkling of his mom’s antique wind chime, but the sound doesn’t quite reach Lance’s eyes.

“Yeah. I guess we do.”

Keith opens his mouth to respond. With what remains a mystery, but the big reveal doesn’t come to him before Sendak hollers for him once again.

Keith can’t deny him. Not yet.

He sends a regretful look Lance’s way, but Lance just shrugs, expression simple and aloof again.

“Duty calls. You better go before he chews you out a new asshole.”

“Yeah. I’ll, uh… see you again later,” Keith says lamely. Then, he tacks on a stilted, “Promise,” even though he can’t honestly promise much.

But the lie is worth the way Lance looks at him.

“Yeah? I’ll hold you to it, then,” Lance whispers, and he looks alive like this, eyes alight and awaiting.

But, _shit_ , Keith was never very good at keeping promises.

**Author's Note:**

> i am not sure why i started a new story like this when i have so many wip's but here we go LOL
> 
> anyway, please tell me what you think!!
> 
> if you want to talk to me or want to know more about how you can support me or request a piece of writing, you can find me on [tumblr](https://highfalutinbabybirb.tumblr.com) and on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/highfalutinBaby)! i'm always happy to talk about whatever :)


End file.
